[OFB Cafe] Sarah Palin: She's not ready

[Timothy Butler]

>
> "The Bush doctrine, which flung open the doors to the catastrophe in
> Iraq, was such a fundamental aspect of the administration’s foreign
> policy that it staggers the imagination that we could have someone no
> further than a whisper away from the White House who doesn’t even know
> what it is.

	Well, the fundamental problem with this is simple: there is not one  
Bush doctrine. Charles Krauthammer, the commentator who created the  
term, notes that there are actually four different things that have  
been given the title "Bush Doctrine" over the last few years. He  
observes that Gibson was using Bush Doctrine II whereas Palin answered  
something along the lines of Bush Doctrine IV.

	Karl Rove, who, for better or worse, ought to know what the Bush  
Doctrine is as well as anybody else also cited four different doctrines.

	Had I been asked, I probably would have answered concerning the  
doctrine of preemption, but when Palin started going in the direction  
that she did, it recalled to mind that, particularly during the 2004  
Election, the Bush Doctrine often referred to the idea of spreading  
democracy via the United State's might.

	Of all the things she could have stumbled on, this surely was not a  
troubling one. After all, which version of the Bush Doctrine should  
she have cited?

	Krauthammer on the term he coined and Palin's response:
         http://townhall.com/columnists/CharlesKrauthammer/2008/09/13/charlie_gibsons_gaffee

	Related comments by the LA Times:
	http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/09/sarah-palin-abc.html

	Ben Smith, who seems to usually lean Obama's way also comments:
	http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0908/The_Bush_doctrine.html

	-Tim


---
Timothy R. Butler | "Into this Universe, and why not knowing,
Editor, OFB.biz   | Nor whence, like Water willy-nilly flowing:
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timothybutler.us  | I know not whither, willy-nilly blowing."
                                            -- Edward FitzGerald